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We speak with San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria about the commitments he outlined in his 2023 State of The City Address. Then, this year’s flu season has so far been a doozy. By the time November was over, it might have felt like everyone you know had the flu. But is it as bad as we think? And, the Colorado River, a central source of water for much of the Western United States, is drying up. We hear about a new podcast from The Los Angeles Times documenting the history of the river and how so many people have come to rely on it. Then, portions of California are seeing record amounts of rainfall this winter with a lot of that water going straight down storm drains on a path to the Pacific Ocean. But some communities are capturing what they can and storing it in underground aquifers. Finally, the root causes of homelessness are often attributed to drug addiction, mental illness or poverty. But research points to housing affordability as the most significant factor that leads to homelessness.
Gun rights advocates have filed a lawsuit challenging a California law that would allow private citizens to sue manufacturers of illegal firearms. Then, a federal appeals court found a California law that sought to ban private, for-profit prisons in the state unconstitutional. It's a major setback for immigration activists who have been fighting the government's reliance on private detention centers to hold migrants. Later, San Diego’s COVID-19 numbers have been trending downward over the past several weeks, and after its latest omicron surge, the county entered the CDC’s lowest warning tier earlier this month; about the same time that President Biden declared that the coronavirus pandemic was over. We talk about whether the pandemic is actually over. And finally, PEN America recently announced the winners of their 2022 Prison Writing Awards, which recognize exceptional works from incarcerated writers that will be published in a forthcoming anthology. The first place winn